Magpie
by SageSins
Summary: "According to an old superstition, the number of magpies one sees determines how the story will end…" Oneshot writen for ShinkWeek 2015.


_..._

 _"According to an old superstition, the number of magpies one sees determines how the story will end…"_

 _..._

* * *

One for Sorrow

It wasn't supposed to be like this.

Where the hero was gone and the evil flourished.

We had prepared you, sent you out of your forest home and to the corners of the Kingdom to fight devils. You accomplished deeds both great and small, all at no true benefit to yourself aside from further aid on the journey we set you upon. Battered and bruised, you cried more often than you slept. You were entrusted to be our savior. It is why we let them shape you in such horrible ways.

A child.

A boy.

Sent into the darkness to bring back the light.

 _They_ did this, it was _their_ will; that's what we told ourselves so we might sleep instead of crying. Everyone watched, because we trusted _their_ promises, because we put more value into our peace over your happiness.

So we watched.

And we waited.

And when you fell into the long slumber the world was devoured by the darkness.

For seven years we wondered why. Why _they_ would steal a poor boys happiness and home, why we let it happen, why we all must suffer. Deceit, regret, guilt - it ate away at us in the hours when the darkness did not and our hearts became black as pitch to match the lies we told ourselves.

Like everyone else, I blamed myself. I could have helped. Should have helped.

The King dismissed you and never gave a second thought, thinking you only played pretend.

The man from the dessert was playing too, only he was playing for keeps, and the next morning the King was dead and you were gone. And I should have helped.

I should have shown you that you weren't alone.

But I didn't, and you were, and seven years of war changed us all.

* * *

Two for Joy

Two lights are birthed from the sorrow of the temple, like a dream whispered in the hymn brought to life. A hero and his light, ill prepared for the path they've been set upon.

 _I have been waiting for you_ , the words echo from my heart, and beneath the cloying fabric of my mask they taste like tears. Tear of happiness or sorrow I cannot tell.

The red of my gaze should have set you wary, it would have done so to anyone else. But you aren't anyone else, you never were, else you would not be you. So your sword lowers and a smile pulls your lips - innocent and tired - as I recite the end of days.

 _One in deep forest…  
One on high mountain…  
One under the vast lake…  
One within the house of the dead…  
One inside a goddess of the sand…_

You nod, you're eager, and as much as I am happy at this I cannot help a whisper as you walk away to begin your journey.

 _I'm sorry._

Even so I bite back a smile. Because I know for your sacrifice that we - that I - will finally find peace.

* * *

Three for a Girl

When you emerge from the forest it's raining and you're crying. You sit down on the same tree stump she always did trying to find some ghost of her still there. But she's gone and your legs are too long to find comfort and you slide down into the wet grass and cry harder for it.

No one even tells stories of the heroes crying.

You try to talk to your fae but the tears choke every word in your throat, and though your light tries to offer solace she can do nothing to soothe this wound.

Because the death of innocence is a fate we all must face, and nothing can soften its blow.

But I have been where you are before so I reveal myself from shadows, walking to stand before you, waiting patiently until you notice that you aren't alone anymore.

 _The flow of time is always cruel. Its speed seems different for each person, but no one can change its course…_

The words are like a knife to a wounded heart; they offer no ease for your pain. But you wipe your eyes and smile, lips wobbling and eyes brighter than they have any right to be as you stare up at me.

The rain stops. Your eyes dry. And when I offer my hand you grasp it, and together we pull you back up on your feet.

* * *

Four for a Boy

The fire temple does you no favors. In the beginning I'm afraid of those fires and what they might mean for you.

And at the end I'm afraid of what losing you might mean for me.

You ask me why. Why you. Why any of this. Why were they so cruel. Why you should even bother. The question disturbs me, but the answer I offer even more so.

 _A feeling in the heart that becomes even stronger over time._ Through it, you will know which way to go…

The words mean nothing, just like this whole story you've been cast into. It is a cruel joke, a jest meant to pass the time and nothing more. We suffer because _they_ say so. There is no deeper meaning beyond this one truth.

Even so you smile and thank me for bandaging the wounds of your skin and your soul, when nothing could be further from the truth. I am the one who obeys their plans. I am the one who sends you into that darkness to be hurt. I am the evil you should be fighting against, kicking and screaming and cursing.

 _Do not follow me. Do not listen to me. I am poison._

Instead you thank me and follow where I lead with a fool's smile on a heroes face.

* * *

Five for Silver

I save the blue princess so you don't have to; it's the least I can do. Even so she runs off to get herself killed and makes your job all the more difficult. I'm sorry, but you're not and you dive willingly into that lake, past the murky depths and into the temple hidden in the cold.

A day and a night pass before you emerge, soaked and shaking with shadows in your eyes. You are haunted by something I cannot begin to understand, though I wish I could if only to take some of the burden from your shoulders.

For hours you merely sit on the shore of that tiny isle, staring out at the lake as the waters refill and the sun rises, every wave a splendor of shimmering orange.

You say you don't know who you are anymore. A hero, maybe, but that's not you. It's just a title, a name, and it says very little about who you are beneath it all. You say you were once a boy who caught bugs and slept in trees and kept toads in your house. And now you slay demons and spill your blood across the land and you don't know how you got from there to here.

I think about myself. How I used to play music to the poes in the fields by night and how I ate marzipan until I would become ill and how I could sleep for hours beneath the sun. And now I hide away from the light and weave lies around a boy's head to trick him into being a martyr and I don't know how I got from there to here either.

Seven years of sleep.

Seven years of war.

In the end, they really aren't so different.

 _The clear water's surface reflects growth,_ I whisper to the waves lapping against our shore, both of us staring at our pasts. We should be moving on, not remaining idle as the land rots should guilt us into moving. But we stay and stare at the sunrise long after your clothes have dried and my eyes grow heavy. My words mean nothing to me, ringing farce, but again you seem to take comfort in them and after enough time passes you smile and stand.

Thank you, you whisper, and offer me your hand.

I grasp it, and together we pull me back up to my feet.

* * *

Six for Gold

Everything is burning.

I can't stop it. I never could. It was inevitable; this was how it was to happen. Even so the bandages on my arms and hands are scorched and my hair singed and soot coats the inside of my throat as I fight to save people I know are already dead.

When I feel the shadow bubbling up from the past I race to stop it, knowing I cannot.

And when I feel you approach, even knowing what must come next…

 _Get back!_

I am thrown like a child's plaything to the dirt, like I was never powerful enough to pose a threat in the first place. Because I wasn't. Because even when I try my efforts are in vain.

When I come to ash has painted us both gray, and aside from the color of our eyes we look so much alike it might be considered amusing were these different circumstances.

The world around us is chaos; houses mere embers and people covered in the ash much as we. Bright eyes and tears and defeated souls all around. A cat wanders past, covered in the same filth, looking for something or someone it will never find.

You never ask but I hear the question beneath your long sigh; _what now?_

I sigh. _To the crypt that will draw you into the infinite darkness. To the bottomless pit that absorbs even time._

We both pull each other up, wiping off our faces and shaking off the soot. I offer to take care of this town, because it's the least I can do while you carry on with the temple hidden below. Again you thank me, but you do not know that I should not be thanked. Because I took the easy way out and sent you to deal with the monsters while I merely handled death.

I am afraid of the things you do, the places you walk blindly into, that I would never in a thousand lifetimes. How a small boy from the forests can walk into such despair when I was born to yet refuse to do so… I will never understand your heroic heart.

You let me trick you. You let me lie to you. You must know by now, yet still you let me lead you down this path.

Why?

* * *

Seven for a Secret

 _Past,  
present,  
future…_

I wish I could change them all. But I am not the one cast to play such a role, only you, and you have already chosen to follow their paths to the bitter end.

The desert does me no favors. I am prepared and yet the heat steals my sanity and leaves me a sobbing mess, begging for forgiveness to the sun. For a different ending to this tale that has already been written. For a chance to rewind and redo and amend for whatever mistakes have led you and I to this fate.

I would give anything to save us from this. My pride. My honor. My life. Every sacrifice is worth it to fix this without having to sacrifice you.

But it's too late for that, isn't it? The very moment I sent you into that first temple I stole your childhood. In the second the flames burned away your naivety. In the third you made peace with the life you found yourself cast into. In the fourth you accepted the mantle of your own legend. And in the fifth…

In the fifth…

You transcend yourself. Transcend me. You walk through time as I walk through sand, without disturbing a single grain unless you intend to do exactly that. You change things no man should be able, reforging the world to aid you on your path.

And it is within this achievement that I truly feel you have overcome me and my riddles and my lies. You have become a hero, a god amongst men, a living legend.

And still you obey me. You obey _them_.

How I wish you wouldn't.

But I cannot stop you, because you are greater than me in every way. I am but a shadow and you are the light. You now forge the path that I merely follow.

I cry. You smile.

 _Don't worry,_ you whisper.

I know for your sacrifice that we - that _I_ \- will finally find peace. And now, at the end of all things, I know it is a peace I do not want.

* * *

Never to be Told

I wish I was brave enough to tell you.

But all I can do is recite the lines they wrote for me long ago, just as you choose to fill the role _they_ wrote for you.

I know that this is the end of the story. I know how this story ends. I've always known. But it doesn't make it hurt any less and I'm shaking as I stare at you one final time.

 _I have things I want to tell only to you._

You're shaking too, or at least I like to think that you are. Not to think you weak or scared, but to think that you hated this as much as I, that you might not have been as willing as you always let on. That you wanted to change this too. That you were as trapped in _their_ machinations as I.

But there is no room for maybe. There is no room for if only. No room for you and I to become we. Even though you walk through time with the power to change a great many things, there is no us to make room for in all the times in all the worlds.

Even so, for that last moment before I go, I allow myself a dream.

That we both found peace at the end of the road, and happiness too. That for once war and sleep did not control our lives and that we instead forged our own paths. That fate was not unkind. That we choose our own destiny. That we said the things we hid from one another.

I dream that you felt the same way about me as I did about you.

 _Please… forgive me…_

* * *

Magpie

One for sorrow,  
Two for joy,  
Three for a girl,  
Four for a boy,  
Five for silver,  
Six for gold,  
Seven for a secret,  
Never to be told.

-English nursery rhyme, c. 1780. Author unknown.


End file.
